St. Anthony the Great (c. 251-356)

The father of monks. A young Egyptian landowner who heard the Gospel read in church - go, sell what you have and give it to the poor - and did exactly that, around the year 270. He lived near his village, then in a tomb, then twenty years sealed in an abandoned fort on the Nile, and walked out of it, by the account of those who were there, neither wasted nor wild but whole. He went on into the inner desert near the Red Sea, where the monastery that bears his name still stands. His Life, written by St Athanasius who knew him, crossed the empire within a generation and made monasticism a way of life for thousands. The Sayings keep him plain and humane: he saw the snares of the enemy spread over the whole earth, and asked who could get through them, and heard: humility. Feast: January 17.